a tribute to ritualism that this church had dragooned him into
accepting.

"My friends," he began slowly and softly, with his hands folded
behind him, "first a few words of testimony from any who can witness
to the miracle of the Spirit in our daily life. We are crushed
sometimes with the brutal weight of matter, and yet over all the
Spirit broods and gives light and life. Who can bear witness to
this miracle?"

"I can!" cried a man, who rose trembling with deep feeling.

His high, well-moulded forehead showed the heritage of intellectual
power. His eyes, soft and tender as a woman's, had in their depths
the record of a great sorrow.

Taking his watch out of his pocket, he looked at it a moment, and,
as the tears began to steal down his face, spoke in a tremulous
voice.

"Seven years, four months, three days and six hours ago the Spirit
of God came to my poor lost soul and found it in a dirty saloon on
the East Side. I was dead--dead to shame, dead to honour, dead to
love, dead to the memory of life. I was so low I found scant welcome
in hell's own port, the saloon. They knew me and dreaded to see
me. I had served time in prison, and when I drank I was an ugly
customer for the bravest policeman to meet alone.

"Ragged, dirty, blear-eyed, besotted, I was seated on a whisky
barrel wondering how I could beat the barkeeper out of a drink,